David Bahn – Reflections

Matthew 7:1-6

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. ²For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

³“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? ⁴How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? ⁵You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

We’ve got it all backwards: we think we can judge peoples’ motives and should not judge their actions. We protest that those who have adopted an ungodly lifestyle surely must simply be a product of their genetics; they don’t want to dishonor God. So we believe what they do doesn’t matter. We assume that people who do vile and egregious things are simply mentally incompetent; therefore their actions escape judgment.

We must never forget that we have our own issues and failures; that our sins are no more acceptable than anyone else’s. In the book, The Shack, Mack is told that he must sit in the judgment seat: rendering judgment on the actions of various people. Initially this is simple. He could judge the man who had murdered his daughter. He could judge those who had committed heinous crimes. But he was eventually confronted with the need to judge God if he was to take this all the way back to the source. The lesson of that chapter is profound and powerful. In reality, anytime we seek to judge another, we are seeking to occupy a seat only God can fill.

Jesus says, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.” Jesus is saying here, however, that before we render judgment about others’ lives and actions we must be clear about our own shortcomings. There is a great difference between impugning someone’s motives and helping a brother or sister who has a speck in his or her eye. And as we relate to others in their brokenness and ours, we do well to rejoice that God’s judgment on sin was poured out on his own Son. Those who take refuge in him and his righteousness will treat their brother or sister kindly. We’ll make certain we’ve removed the log from our own eye before we work on the speck in another’s eye. And that’s a daily process.